Ask different chiropractors, or doctors, what the goal of a treatment is. The answer you get won’t vary too much in the broad sense: it’s usually to treat a disease, get rid of pain, or otherwise remove a symptom.
But I look at Chiropractic in a different way. Indeed, all truly wellness endeavors aren’t seeking to correct a problem necessarily, but to allow the body to function normally. This method of thinking operates on a different assumption than most western medicine practices. It assumes, at the most basic and fundamental level, that there is an inherent wisdom to the functioning of the body that is continuously trying to keep it healthy, to enhance our health, and to have us function at our best.
The goal of Chiropractic, of each and every adjustment, is to remove interference to the full function of the systems that make up the human body. Primarily this occurs through the nerve system, but it affects every single system in the body, including those not necessarily recognized by western medicine, such as chi.
Once that interference is removed, the body has a greater opportunity to heal, to function as it wants to.
This awareness demands a different way of looking at symptoms.
Take, for example, a common cold. In the western medicine model, these symptoms are to be squashed, controlled, eradicated so that we can fulfill on our responsibilities, right? So we can go to work, parent effectively, or because we don’t deserve to feel like crap. But these drugs make it harder for the body to heal, by suppressing that cough, stopping the runny nose, killing the fever, eliminating the body aches, making us less likely to rest, all of which hamper our healing, and could prolong our illness.
In Chiropractic, we would adjust the person. Not because it would cure them of the cold or lessen the symptoms. But because we know that when the body is functioning with less interference, it has a better chance to heal. What typically happens is that in the short term, people feel worse. Their symptoms increase as the immune system fires up and does what it needs to do to restore balance.
I’ve seen this first hand with my son. He was dealing with a cough for over a week before my wife and I put him on an aggressive adjusting schedule of three times a day. After one day he had recovered and the cough was gone. His body had done what it needed to do, and the cough was not necessary any more.
Listen carefully to that. Chiropractic did NOT remove his cough. It made his body more effective at ridding itself of the thing that made the cough necessary. Thus, healing was able to occur.
So, the goal of Chiropractic care, is to help the body heal, however that looks. This is what it means to live a Brilliant Life.